The Five Narrative Codes of Roland Barthes in Aravind Adiga's The White Tiger

ABSTRACT
Tarmila, Evi. 10.05.1.1.1.00013. The Five Narrative Codes of Roland Barthes in Aravind Adiga’s The White Tiger. Thesis. English Study Program of The Faculty of Social and Cultural Sciences, The University of Trunojoyo Madura. Advisors: (I) Erika Citra Sari Hartanto, S.S., M. Hum (II) Suci Suryani, S.S., M. Pd.

The White Tiger is the first novel of Aravind Adiga that won Man Booker Prize for fiction in 2008. This novel consists of many symbols, connotation, and cultures that exist in India like the dowry system for women and caste system of Varna and Jati. This novel also tells about the social gap which appears among Indian society because of that caste system. Furthermore, this study uses the five narrative codes of Roland Barthes to analyze this novel. Those five narrative codes are; hermeneutic code, proairetic code, cultural code, connotative code, and symbolic code. These five narrative codes are appropriate to use in analyze and interpret this novel because this novel consists of many cultural aspects, connotations, and symbols that they are part of these five narrative codes itself.
This study applies qualitative research design to analyze the source of data, and the key instrument is the writer herself. This study finds the five narrative codes of Roland Barthes are applied in The White Tiger. The hermeneutic codes are found in the title of the novel, and from fugitive expectation toward the major character. The proairetic codes are found into five sequences of the plot; exposition, complication, climax, falling action, and resolution. The cultural codes are found in the stereotypes of the master toward the servant, and Indian cultures; the caste system and dowry system. The connotative codes are found through the characters of Balram Halwai and Ashok, and the places that develop the theme of the novel. And the last, the symbolic codes which the code of theme are found in the binary opposition of ‘lower’ and ‘upper’ caste or ‘the Darkness’ and ‘the Light’.